“Mary, my love, your poor mother couldn’t stand the strain, she’s dead.”
Mary sat as if stricken to the heart, unable to speak, but she was a girl of great force of character, and she was rallying all her forces to meet this quite unexpected blow.
So her father resumed, saying, “She always had a weak heart as you know, dear, and besides she always had a dread that we should come to poverty. And so I suppose, when some heartless fool blurted out in her hearing that Levy and Stewart had burst up, the blow was more than she could stand. And so she died far away from me. Poor Mary, dear wife. There’s one consolation, she went as she had always wished to go without a long probation of pain, instantaneously from one life to another, thank God. And now, dear ones, I’ll get you to excuse me. I’ve been very hard hit and I feel old and tired. I need rest and quiet, and so I’ll go to my room and lie down a bit. Christmas, I’ll leave you to comfort Mary as no one else can.” And he left the room, walking heavily, almost dragging one foot after the other.
C. B. rose on the instant and strode to Mary’s side, where she sat with lips tight shut, her cheeks flushed and her eyes bright and dry.
“Dearest one,” he murmured, taking her in his strong arms, “don’t fight against your natural feelings. It is sometimes good to cry, I feel sure it would be good for you now. And if ever any one had reason to cry it is at the loss of a good mother.”
The last word, softly uttered as it was by her lover, touched the hidden spring of her tears, and they flowed, easily, gently, but copiously, C. B. holding her in his arms and stroking her beautiful hair as if she were a child. And at last she lifted her head and looked him full in the face, saying—
“I do thank God, Christmas, that we’ve got you in this difficult time. Do you know, I think even poor old dad will come to lean upon you directly as I feel I must do now. Why is it, I wonder? I suppose because you are really dwelling in the shadow of the Almighty God, and the changes and chances of this mortal life seem such trivial things to you.”
C. B. fondled her hair a moment or two longer before he replied—
“No, darling, they none of them seem trivial, but I know in whom I have believed, and because He is infinitely wise I do not worry, being sure that He will do His part. I only try to do mine without hitting my head against a brick wall, as I now know some people do if they want to get it down, instead of waiting to hear from God whether it is good that the wall shall come down or not.”